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Pat Steadman's gay-rights journey now includes civil unions

By Lynn BartelsThe Denver Post

Posted:
03/21/2013 11:20:24 AM MDT

Updated:
03/22/2013 01:12:58 AM MDT

Laurel Javors, left, and her partner Mary Bogus share a moment during the Post-Passage Punch Party hosted by One Colorado at the Punch Bowl Social in Denver, March 12, 2013. The Colorado House voted 39-26 Tuesday to allow gay couples to form civil unions despite protests from Republicans that the issue will wind up in court because it doesn't offer religious exemptions. (Craig F. Walker, The Denver Post)

FILE -- Democratic Sen. Pat Steadman is embraced by colleague Senator Gail Schwartz after a civil unions law for same-sex couples took another step in the Colorado Senate as lawmakers took an initial vote in favor of the legislation on Friday, February 8, 2013. (Cyrus McCrimmon, The Denver Post)

Sen. Pat Steadman, who has spent more than two decades fighting for equality for gays, knew that the legislature was going to pass a civil unions bill this session so he deliberately chose the number: Senate Bill 11.

His partner, Dave Misner, who died last September after a brief battle with pancreatic cancer, was born on May 11. They had been together 11 years.

Out Front Colorado, a gay news publication, asked readers for suggested headlines for the event. Among the offerings:

"Hick to gays: I do."

Steadman also chose the location for the bill signing. He said one reason he selected the new state facility at 1200 Broadway is because the word "history" is displayed on the building.

For someone who cried in the streets of Denver the night Coloradans passed Amendment 2 — which prohibited laws from protecting gays from discrimination — the journey to the civil-unions bill signing has been truly historic for Steadman.

"Bit by bit, we've been making slow and steady progress and some day — not today — some day we're going to win the race," Steadman said Thursday.

The 48-year-old lawmaker and Denver Democrat became involved in the state's fledging gay-rights movement in 1991, the same year he passed the bar.

That year, Denver voters defeated Ordinance 1, which would have changed the wording of anti-discrimination laws to exclude people of different "sexual orientation." Denver became the largest major metropolitan area ever to uphold a gay-rights law in a general election.

The following years, Steadman and other leaders in that fight worked on the campaign to defeat Amendment 2. Steadman said there wasn't much support from Colorado Democratic bigwigs, who assumed the measure would fail.

It passed, and Colorado was dubbed "the hate state."

Pamela Thiel and Lauren Fortmiller share a laugh following the vote on civil unions at the State Capital in Denver, March 12, 2013. (Craig F. Walker, The Denver Post)

That night, some angry gay-rights activists headed from their gathering to the Democrats' election night party at a downtown Denver hotel, where revelers were cheering the election of Ben Nighthorse Campbell to the U.S. Senate and Bill Clinton's presidential victory in Colorado.

Steadman said there were almost riots but then-Gov. Roy Romer led the activists to a peaceful protest rally on the steps of the state Capitol.

"It was a very volatile, explosive evening with lots of raw emotion," Steadman said. "It was a huge wake-up call."

Steadman began lobbying full time in 1995 and one of his clients was Equality Colorado, which became Equal Rights Colorado, the organization that preceded One Colorado, now the largest gay-rights group in the state.

Steadman helped put a civil-unions-like measure, Referendum I, on the ballot, in 2006. But voters that year rejected Ref I and approved a ballot measure declaring marriage in Colorado as between one man and one woman.

In 2011, he and another gay Denver Democrat, Rep. Mark Ferrandino, introduced the first civil unions bill, giving gay couples many but not all of the rights and responsibilities of marriage. It passed the Democratic-controlled Senate but died by a single vote in the Republican-controlled House Judiciary Committee.

The bill made it out three House committees, thanks to Republican support, but died a stunning death on the House floor the second to last night of the legislative session when Republican Speaker Frank McNulty refused to call it up for debate.

Democrats won back the House in November, Ferrandino was elected the speaker and civil unions passed both chambers in the legislature.

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